de Kenyon doubt whether he might not as well copy the Faun as model a
new bust,--"only, you know, you must not insist on my uncovering these
ears of mine!"

"Nay; I never should dream of such a thing," answered the sculptor,
laughing, as the young Count shook his clustering curls. "I could not
hope to persuade you, remembering how Miriam once failed!"

Nothing is more unaccountable than the spell that often lurks in a
spoken word. A thought may be present to the mind, so distinctly that
no utterance could make it more so; and two minds may be conscious of
the same thought, in which one or both take the profoundest interest;
but as long as it remains unspoken, their familiar talk flows quietly
over the hidden idea, as a rivulet may sparkle and dimple over something
sunken in its bed. But speak the word, and it is like bringing up a
drowned body out of the deepest pool of the rivulet, which has been
aware of the horrible secret all along, in spite of its smiling surface.

And even so, when Kenyon chanced to make a distinct reference to
Donatello's relations with Miriam (though the subject was already in
both their minds), a ghastly emotion rose up out of the depths of the
young Count's heart. He trembled either with anger or terror, and
glared at the sculptor with wild eyes, like a wolf that meets you in
the forest, and hesitates whether to flee or turn to bay. But, as Kenyon
still looked calmly at him, his aspect gradually became less disturbed,
though far from resuming its former quietude.

"You have spoken her name," said he, at last, in an altered and
tremulous tone; "tell me, now, all that you know of her."

"I scarcely think that I have any later intelligence than yourself,"
answered Kenyon; "Miriam left Rome at about the time of your own
departure. Within a day or two after our last meeting at the Church of
the Capuchins, I called at her studio and found it vacant. Whither she
has gone, I cannot tell."

Donatello asked no further questions.

They rose from table, and strolled together about the premises, whiling
away the afternoon with brief intervals of unsatisfactory conversation,
and many shadowy silences. The sculptor had a perception of change in
his companion,--possibly of growth and development, but certainly of
change,--which saddened him, because it took away much of the simple
grace that was the best of Donatello's peculiarities.

Kenyon betook himself to repose that night in a grim, old, vaulted